OYO to Lay Off 600 Employees, Hire 250 Players for Sales Team

In this time of hiring and firing, another big news coming from the Softbank-backed Indian hotel aggregator OYO Hotels and Home Pvt. Ltd. Company notified on Saturday (3^rd December 2022) that it's going to cut 600 jobs in its corporate and technology departments while hiring 250 people in the sales team at the same time.

The company said that product and engineering teams are being merged to allow for smoother operation, and that downsizing in tech is also taking place in teams that were developing pilots and proof of concepts such as in-app gaming, social content curation, and patron-facilitated content.

In the second quarter of the fiscal year, the company reported a net loss of 3.33 billion Indian rupees (USD 40.90 million), compared to a loss of 4.14 billion rupees in the first quarter. The fiscal year of the company runs from April 1 to March 31.

Oyo initially filed for IPO (Initial Public Offering) in October 2021, but the plan has been postponed due to market conditions (interest rate hikes, Russia-Ukraine War etc.).

“We will do everything we can to ensure that the majority of the people we have to let go are gainfully employed,” CEO Ritesh Agarwal said.

“As OYO grows and there is a need for some of these roles in the future, we commit to reaching out to them first and providing them with the opportunity,” Ritesh further added.